The two Dioceses of Grahamstown and Natal were constituted in 1853 under the leadership of the incumbent Bishop Armstrong for Grahamstown, and Bishop Colenso for Natal. When Bishop Gray came to the Cape Town Diocese he had a two-tier plan for the mission and growth of the Church, insofar as “he seems to have decided that mission work to the heathen must wait until the work of the Church amongst the settlers, where a start had been made, was in proper order” (Hinchliff 1963: 35). During Bishop Gray’s several road trips he was often confronted by the indigenous people and leaders seeking
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ministry, but he stuck to his imperial plan. The new Bishops for Grahamstown and Natal were key role-players in the colonisation and imperialist orientation of the Church, which would ultimately lead to the underdevelopment of black parishes.
Bishop Colenso
Colenso arrived in the Diocese of Natal on 23 January 1854, and spent ten weeks conducting reconnaissance. During this time “he protested against the hell fire preaching of the missionaries of his age, who presented the heathen with a clear choice between conversion and a graphically described prediction. He refused to accept that every custom of the heathen that it must be evil, just because it was their custom” (Hinchliff, 1968: 65).
However, according to Colenso’s theology the indigenous people must find glory of the Christian message and the light to all humanity. He refuted the notion that African culture must be intrinsically evil. This was the legacy of cultural imperialism that “every imported denomination has brought with it the trappings of the culture of the people who brought it. Christians of every culture must mutually appreciate the heritage of one another’s race, without prejudice” (Mugambi, 1995: 50).
Bishop Colenso used his position as the first Anglican bishop of Natal for the defence of Zulu independence and culture against aggression from the imperial missionaries, and this has been widely recognised today. Hinchliff asserts that Maurice had a significant influence on Colenso’s thinking that “Maurice was the great apostle of freedom. He fought for the economy of the poor, for the freedom of men within the Church to speak the truth and freedom of the Church from the pressure of outside authority and interests”
(1963: 15).
During his controversy over eucharist. Maurice wrote a letter to Mrs. Colenso, asking her to “tell the bishop, with my kindest love, that the battle over missionary methods, he is fighting is ours also: nothing less than the battle whether the devil or the Father of our Lord Jesus Christ is God” (Cox, 1888: 91). Throughout the controversy, Colenso continued to be influenced by Maurice’s ideas.
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Bishop Colenso went to investigate the only mission station at Umkhomazi Drift, which had been founded by Bishop Gray, where he discovered that no work that had yet been started (Burnett, 1953). Furtheremore, Colenso was keen to see the mission station operational and thus transferred Umkhomazi Drift mission station to a new location to be started at Ekukhanyeni, and to be “ one of the catechists from Umkhomazi Drift, and left him in charge of the wild, unbroken site of the future Ekukhanyeni. Robertson was to become the great missionary to the Zulus” (Hinchliff, 1964:63).
According to Burnett, Colenso “[regarded] himself as a missionary bishop and wanted to make the acquaintance of the chiefs and see for himself how the tribes lived” (1953: 39).
He wanted to convert whole tribes, rather than individuals. That was why he placed himself before the leaders of the indigenous people and their subjects. This would not allow misconceptions to prevail when he presented his plan of action, as he came to settle in his Diocese. It took a person of conviction to visit the indigenous chiefs at a time of tension, when local populations were referred to as “blood thirsty” (Lewis and Edwards, 1934: 303).
However, Bishop Colenso reported that “the savage was noble and that the missionary ought to attempt to build upon the elements of nobility in African religion. The missionary ought to use that knowledge of African” (Hinchliff, 1968:66). Furthermore, Bishop Colenso refused to regard the heathen African as a wicked savage, as they knew a great deal about God.
Bishop Colenso met Theophilus Shepstone, who was secretary for Native Affairs. He accompanied the bishop, as an interpreter, wherever he went. Shepstone’s imperial policy was to “[retain] Zulu customs and institutions, where they could be reconciled to Western standards, coloured the bishop’s approach to missionary work. He regarded the missionary’s task as that of leavening the social system of the African with the light of the gospel and not merely converting detribalised individuals and turning them into black Europeans” (Burnett, 1953: 40).
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Shepstone’s policy fits well with the new Bishop Colenso. Shepstone was “criticized because his policy kept the Zulu and the settler apart while doing very little to raise the level of civilisation amongst the tribesmen (Hinchliff, 1963:62). Bishop Colenso, of course, was not innocent because he knew that Shepstone was carrying forward the agenda of colonisation and imperialism, and the ultimate end was the subjugation of the indigenous people.
Furthermore, Colenso had been an advocate of political and social justice, and encouraged Africans to make use of such political rights insofar as the law allowed. I already alluded to the fact that he was influenced by Maurice’s theory of the poor who need freedom. Other missionaries had undertaken the responsibility of delivering the Christian message across cultural boundaries, and found that the responsibility for achieving this undertaking, and initiating the process of contextualisation, rested on their shoulders. Hesselgrave argues that the “missionary cannot communicate without concerning himself with culture, because communication is inextricable from culture, just as Christ became flesh and dwell among people, so propositional truth must have a cultural incarnation to be meaningful. In the second place, the missionary cannot communicate Christianity without concerning himself with culture, although, Christianity is super-cultural in its origin and truly, it is cultural in its application” (1991: 1).
Taylor frankly admits that “during the eighteenth to the twentieth century’s, the missionaries of the Christian Church have commonly assumed that Western civilization and Christianity were two aspect of the same gift which they were commissioned to offer to the rest of mankind” (1963: 68, Ojkivuosa, 1977: 1).
Most missionaries focused on conversion and changing people in their respective culture.
Although Colenso had a different view of indigenous culture and values, the overall purpose of the missionary enterprise was to aid the transformation of a people (whether individually or as an entire tribe) who would then automatically work for the transformation of that culture.
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Ekukhanyeni Mission Station
All references so far are related to “white parishes where the congregations were predominantly English settlers in the colony. The other half of the Church’s work was the missions, which was different” (Hinchliff, 1963: 139). Therefore the mission stations were managed by colonial priests up to the middle of the eighteenth century. The indigenous missionary workers, catechists, lay-preachers, deacons and priests were in the background of the missionary enterprise. Historian, Philippe Denis argues that “without them the missionary would have achieved almost nothing” (1995: 9). This was the situation that Bishop Colenso confronted in his years in the Diocese.
The main task before Colenso was to establish a new centre for his mission in the Diocese. Adjacent to his residence, he established the Ekukhanyeni mission station, which was the real centre of all missionaries. From Ekukhanyeni the reach of the Church was expected to spread until they covered every native reserve in Natal. The station contained “a printing-press, a school, a theological college, a farm, a smithy, a carpenter’s shop, a brick-field and a Church” (Hinchliff, 1964: 68).
Bishop Colenso’s attitude towards native development, education and leadership was evident in his “missionary writings in the establishment of the Ekukhanyeni school at bishopstowe” (Lieta, 2003: 243). He was determined to establish a single centre from where he “planned to oversee both mission and the normal parochial work of the Diocese” (Burnett, 1953; Colenso, 1860; Hinchliff, 1964: 62). This was the start of what was, for a time, the most famous settlement in Southern Africa.
Bishop Colenso’s ideas emphasized reason rather than revelation, accepting indigenous culture and was oriented towards a liberal rather than orthodox theology. He sought to Christianize the whole culture and society of the Zulu, rather than make men within that society conform to the pillars of the society of the Church. “He had made his debut as an ambassador of Christ” (1964:63, Natal Mercury, 1866:66).
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Bishop Colenso advocated the idea to “use what already existed in the religious ideas of the Zulus, as a foundation for the preaching of the gospel” (Hinchliff, 1963: 62). He asserted that the African already knew a great deal about God. Therefore, the missionary ought to use that knowledge. It was this positive attitude which led him to listen to the Africans and to learn about their way of life. Lieta notes that, “Colenso was excited by the possibility of using African religious custom as a foothold of Christianity” (2003:
245). However, Hinchliff goes further to state that, “he even thought the idea officiating at a Zulu feast of the first fruits, and, thereby, converting it into a harvest festival” (1964:
63). Bishop Colenso’s thinking was to observe similarities with the Christian festival of
“harvest thanksgiving” (Deuteronomy, 26: 1-11).
The bishop went further to advocate for the Zulu word for God in translating the Bible, instead of a word “which seems to have been coined by the missionaries on the eastern frontier, of uThixo” (Smith, 1950: 98 ff, 102 ff). The Zulus “used the name
‘UNkulunkulu,’ and Xhosas used ‘uTixo.’ Use one word which appeared to be closest to the Christian concept of God“ (Burnett, 1953:62 - 63).
The Ekukhanyeni mission station contained the facilities that alluded to above, which were necessary to reach every part of Zulu life in the reserves. He believed that the mission station had to develop an approach that would give the indigenous people the glory of Christian message and the light in all humanity, rather than the imperial model of
“preventing the reoccurrence of further frontier wars” (Hinchliff, 1963: 47-48).
Furthermore, the mission stations should not be used “to assist in the policy of civilizing and pacifying the frontier” and he saw the role of the mission as “remaining until they [the natives] had become sufficiently civilized to take their place as full citizens of the colony” (Hinchliff, 1968: 45)
It was not always clear to me that mission stations were created to develop, empower, uplift, and evangelize, what Superintendent Philip referred to as “places of refuge”
(Hinchliff, 1968:27). The model of Bishop Colenso was to “replace the conventional message of darkness, division and damnation” (Guy, 2001: 22) to offer at Ekukhanyeni a
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model that offered practical training, industrial skills, as well as religious training (Lieta, 2003). Hence, there was a carpenter’s shop, forge, brickyard, as well as a printing press.
Bishop Colenso planned later to include various levels of schooling, a theological college and a hospital. Guy affirms that “Ekukhanyeni was to be the centre from which light would be taken to other areas” (1983: 50-51).
This went a long way to demonstrate that bishop Colenso respected indigenous people, and the school and its pupils, not as faceless ‘kaffirs’, but as people with names, like Mkhungo ka-Mpande (King Mpande), Undiane and Ushume (Magena Fuze). The bishop refused to use biblical or European names for the baptismal candidates and wanted to use their parents’ names. The missionaries were up in arms about the way Colenso conducted his mission to the Africans (USPG, Archives, C/AFS 16).
Clearly influenced by Colenso’s approach to Zulu culture, Callaway, once he felt his medical services were no longer required at Ekukhanyeni, was determined to buy a farm well populated with Africans in the country in which he would build up a community.
He started a mission at Springvale, on the western frontier of the colony of Natal. “He set himself to learn the language of the natives and so study their customs, ultimately becoming an authority in these matters” (Page, 1947: 30, Lewis and Edwards, 1934: 357).
Callaway had a development plan for the Africans which also motivated self-reliance.
Callaway spent good deal of his time daily “writing down accounts given by Zulus of their customs, traditions and beliefs” (Lewis and Edwards, 1934: 359; Page, 1947: 30).
Therefore, with the printing press he was able to make translations from the Bible and a prayer book in Zulu. “I have a committee of natives on the translation and we should try to develop Christianity among the natives in their own homes” (Page, 1947: 30). Two leading native converts, Mpengula Mbanga and William Ngcwensa, were members of this committee (Burnett, 1953).
Callaway went further in 1870, and wrote to the effect of European colonisation on the Africans, saying, “we are getting a congregation of whites around us, and they take up the
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land so that the natives have no place to herd their cattle. We tax the natives, make them pay rent, interfere with their customs by our laws, and we do not give them much in return, they can appreciate” (Lewis and Edwards, 1934: 364-365).
Robertson too went to “open a new station at Umlazi, as missionary tentacles spread out from Colenso centre at Ekukhanyeni” (Hinchliff, 1963: 63), where a young African man, Usajabula, joined Robertson’s household and eventually became a catechist. Robertson was already fluent in Zulu and he was laying foundations at Umlazi for a mission. By 1859 there was a little village at Umlazi and the first outstation at Enwabi (Burnett, 1953:
54). He was assisted by Usajabula and Mr. Samuelson, a catechist, expert linguist and carpenter.
Following the removal of Robertson a few years later, the Umlazi mission deteriorated and remained neglected for many years. In 1927, the most important development of the mission was with its five outstations and medical work. The Anglican Trust Board lent money for building a ‘real’ church at Umlazi. The Umlazi mission was taken over by whites and they fenced it. This resulted in parishioners moving to worship at Enwabi as the first outstation congregation at Umlazi. However, the mission had deteriorated and had to be rebuilt because those whites had left. It became a real mission and five new outstation congregations were created.
Theophilus Shepstone
The administration of Natal was largely in the hands of Shepstone. He was a son of a Methodist missionary in the Eastern Cape. He had visited Natal in 1838 and in 1845, as a diplomatic agent to the Slambie, Congo and Fungo Tribes (Bird Annals of Natal, 1988:
473. Shepstone was appointed because of his past record, both in Congo and the Eastern Cape (Davenport, 1991: 101).
Due to internal wars of chiefs of the period saw an “influx reached flood proportions during a series of Disturbances in the Zulu kingdom” (Thompson, 2001: 95). In 1852 Theophilus was appointed to be in a committee whose functions were mainly for the
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benefit of land-owning colonials and for the creation of a native-location system. It was the “location policy” which drew the bulk of the settlers’ criticism about native settlements (Brookes and de Webb, 1987). Thompson states that “the Natal colonial government tried to place the Africans in reserves which it called ‘locations,’ leaving the rest of the colony available for white settlement” (2000: 95).
Shepstone followed the imperial model of colonisation. Hatlersby asserts that, “as in most colonies with a settler population, there existed in Natal during the nineteenth century a perpetual controversy between the officials who desired to protect the native population and settlers who desired to exploit them as cheap labour” (1946:1 25-126; Brookes and de Webb, 1987: 57). This was a tension that was felt at the heart of the colonial government.
It was no accident that Bishop Colenso very soon made a tactical alliance with Shepstone.
His ‘location’ policy or imperial model was, “to rule and civilize the Zulus by accepting the tribal structure, laws and even strengthening them, to make governor of the colony the
‘great chief,’ the centre of loyalty for the people and lesser chiefs. In practice, this made Shepstone himself the almost absolute ruler of the Zulu people in Natal” (Hinchliff, 1963:
62). It is my view, however, that this policy kept the Zulu and the settler apart and simply added to the underdevelopment of the indigenous people.
It is my submission that the imperial policy was deposing the chiefs of their authority and power, leaving their subjects vulnerable to exploitation.
In 1851, Shepstone fought hard to retain the establishment of mission stations in the reserves. However, he believed that these missions should not teach denominational Christianity, because the indigenous people could not be expected to understand subtle theological differences. Despite the ideological difference between Shepstone and Grey, there was a sense in which both men believed that mission stations might be an important factor in solving the native problem.
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Imperial model was that there were those who believed that separation of blacks from whites was the only way to secure justice for the farmers or safety of the settlers. After the victory of the Nationalist Party in 1948, South Africa consolidated its power by systematically “eliminating every vestige of black participation in the central political system” (Thompson, 1990: 187). This was the beginning of an era characterized by apartheid laws.
There were those who believed that races must live together because it was essential for white land owners’ labour, or because they honestly believed that peaceful cohesion was right, and was the way forward for South Africa. However, the advocates of the imperial missionary model of the eighteenth century believed that the right thing was to convert men out of their native and heathen culture and community, and settle them in a context where they could absorb civilization and Christianity (Hinchliff, 1963).
Shepstone and Colenso made a pact to persuade the chiefs and principal men living in reserves in the Table mountain district, “to send their sons to school at Ekukhanyeni. He intimated that Colenso was a great missionary, and gave him the name, Uyise wabantu- Usobantu” (Burnett, 1953: 44). Bishop Colenso wanted to give skills and education to the boys to help the future chiefs “to absorb the tide of civilization that was to sweep over their land, might be so willing to be ruled by European methods, above all, to learn and practice it” (Lewis and Edwards, 1934: 80-81). It is my view, however, that this was a strategy of empowering the underdeveloped indigenous people, unlike the one executed by Bishop Gray, which was a strategy of conquest.
Shepstone also coined the name “Usobantu” (Father of the people) for Colenso so, that the chiefs and principal men in the reserves would allow their sons to come to Ekukhanyeni. Elsewhere, Sir Harry Smith in the Eastern Cape also referred to Bishop Gray as, “the great Inkosi of the Christians, the chief minister of the Church, which was the religion of the Queen,” when he introduced the bishop to the chiefs (Lewis and Edwards, 1934: 40). These gestures lowered the importance of the chiefs and elevated the bishop to a higher position.